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Sky Island Journal - Reviews
 

Jason Splichal and Jeff Sommerfeld, Founders and Co-Editors, Sky Island Journal

Smiling at the Executioner, April 2020 Review

  • Pushcart Prize Nominee 2020

  • Best of the Net Nominee 2021

"Smiling at the Executioner" is the epitome of what we consider powerful poetry to be. The emotional and intellectual transport it provides is nothing short of astonishing. Vivid, palpable imagery saturates the perfect pacing of this svelte, knife-like piece. Your craft is elegant, tight, and overtly physical throughout; the ebb and flow of your restraint and revelation rewards us in ways that linger long after your poem has left our lips. Your ability to extend a metaphor tenderly and unflinchingly is a true gift. Like all great art, "Smiling at the Executioner" is a gift that keeps giving; we discover more about it, and ourselves, with every reading. Its voice spoke to us immediately, and we are beyond excited to share it with the world.

 

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Rate My Professor: A Rebuttal, November 2022 Review

"Rate My Professor: A Rebuttal" spoke to us immediately. Intensely personal yet wildly accessible, it transports and challenges us in ways that poems seldom do. This powerful, vulnerable, tapestry of human landscape is a meditation on the presence of absence and the absence of presence, and it bears fruit in such beautiful and unexpected ways... The elegance of your craft, and “Rate My Professor: A Rebuttal,” are two gifts that keep on giving; we discover more about them, and ourselves, with every reading.

Pop Quiz, January 2024 Review

"Pop Quiz" is vulnerable, tense, powerful, and so incredibly accurate; it transports and challenges us in ways that poems seldom do. This piece—like so many of our favorite M.B. pieces—is a meditation on the presence of absence and the absence of presence, and it bears fruit in such personal, beautiful, and unexpected ways. Like all great art, “Pop Quiz” sticks its landing and is a gift that keeps on giving; we discover more about it, and ourselves, with every reading.

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